I have a favorite non-autism blog right now. It’s by friend/artist Carla Lipkin called A Water Colour A Day. I love Carla’s work (and she’s a lovely person too).The blog is a work of art — you must check it out.

It got me thinking of how another friend of mine, years ago when Poloroids were the rage, took pictures of herself every day the year before she turned fifty. On her fiftieth birthday, she put them all up and they made an exceptional piece. Blogging and journaling can be art too. The watercolour above is something I did a couple of months ago really quickly. I used to paint all the time while I was taking art studio and art history. Now it seems my duties as mother have taken precendence over the projects I really love doing. I have to ask myself why this has happened?

Looking at Carla’s blog made me think about the importance of the everyday. For some of us, we like to document it. We really do take the small stuff for granted. Adam also has artistic ability. Wouldn’t it be fun to make a little time every day to document something of our lives, no matter how seemingly trivial or small. At the end of the year these little things add up. Besides, isn’t every life a work of art?

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About Me

ESTÉE KLAR

I’m a PhD candidate at York University, Critical Disability Studies, with a multi-disciplinary background in the arts as a curator and writer. I am the Founder of The Autism Acceptance Project (www.taaproject.com), and an enamoured mother of my only son who lives with the autism label. I like to write about our journey, critical issues regarding autism in the area of human rights, law, and social justice, as well as reflexive practices in (auto)ethnographic writing about autism.

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The Joy of Autism:

because finding joy doesn't come without struggle;
because the point is to find it;
because if an autistic person calls autism their way of being, not an illness, then it is;
because every human has value and is a joy;
because despite inhumane acts, I believe in humanity;
but most of all, because of my son Adam.